Just for Giggles
by anon33125
Summary: It's been a while since Yamato has worked with Kakashi, or even seen him for more than an hour in passing. Spending so much time with his ex-ANBU captain and his students brings back memories and raises many more questions about the man's secretive nature... Characters owned by Kishimoto
1. Chapter 1

Internet kept going out, so I wrote a little piece, could become something more, I kind of like this drunk/talk-back Yamato. Anyway, enjoy :) -

A small voice inside my head said that I should probably have left about 5 minutes ago. Ugh, most times that voice didn't even come out until 5 minutes too late. I felt like an idiot, again. Whatever. Nothing new. I dragged myself into a sitting position and attempted to look around. The whole place was pretty topsy-turvy and kinda made me dizzy. I was pretty tempted to just lay my head back on the bar, but I couldn't fall asleep here and that's most definitely what would happen if I stayed. Instead I decided to focus most of my efforts on glaring at the mountain of gray hair that had just walked through the door. Asshole. Sometimes I really hated my senpai. Though I guess he wasn't really my senpai anymore. But still, I called him that. Thought of him that way. Ugh, way too complicated for my drunken brain. Sleep. Sleep would be good. My head fell forward onto the bar, again. Sometimes there's no point in fighting it.

"Tenzo?" The name barely registered, but I was instinctively annoyed.

"It's Yamato," is what I meant to say, I think it sounded more like "ehs ama toe," or something to that extent.

The silver fox of an owner of that other voice simply chuckled and wrapped an arm around my waist, forcing one of mine around his shoulders. I vaguely heard him say something about bringing me home to the bartender and that I'd pay my tab tomorrow (as I usually did, this guy knew me pretty well, unfortunately). And we stumbled out of there before my old captain used the teleportation jutsu to get us to the block I lived on.

Thinking about Kakashi carrying a drunk me home always makes me slightly happier. His hair may have a couple inches of height on me, but if we both shaved our heads, I'd have a good inch or two on him. Plus, I carry at least 20 more pounds than Kakashi on any given day, being drunk and floppy adds another 10 of pure dead weight. So, you see, no matter how strong Kakashi is, I know that I'm a hassle for the old man. Ok, fine, he's only 4 years older than me, but still, you get my point. It's funny when you've known the guy as long as I have. Actually, it's funny when you've only known him for a couple hours, but I digress.

Somehow, just like any other night this happens, we got up the stairs, Kakashi took my key from under my mat, got us inside, and basically threw me on my bed. I'm sure I probably helped with that by faceplanting myself into my pillows, I just want to sleep so bad when I'm drunk. Silver head ducks down, my sandals come off, silver head disappears, a glass of water turns up on my nightstand. I pass out right about the time I hear my door close.

Another night on the town with good old friends that turned into me being drunk alone. It happened quite often. You would think I'd have gotten the message by now and stopped trying. But, like I said earlier, I'm an idiot.


	2. Chapter 2

Waking up the next morning was not pleasant. Especially considering I was woken up by having ice cold water dumped on my face.

"Hey kid, up and at 'em!" sang a voice way too cheerful for, I looked at my buzzing alarm clock, 6AM. Fuck this. I knew who it had to be.

"Fuck off, Genma," I groaned, trying desperately to block the sunlight now streaming into my room.

"Not a chance," came the sunny reply, "just cuz you're taking the captain's genin-sitting job for a while does not mean you get to slack on your Genma time!"

My only response was to groan again. Training Naruto was no mere genin-sitting chore, it was exhausting in every possible sense of the word. That kid was a wound-up stamina machine.

"Every Friday morning at 6AM since the very beginning of time, Genma and Tenzo have greatly enjoyed their joint training session. Even after Genma left ANBU, Tenzo swore he would forever continue their practices since he couldn't stand to lose his last faithful companion." My pillow was dragged out from my grasp, my face slapped uncomfortably against the mattress. "I simply cannot stand by and let hungover Tenzo forget his loving promise, regretting this one morning for the rest of his life."

"Fine," I grumbled, "you made your point. Can you at least make me coffee?"

A steaming mug of warm, brown, deliciously strong-smelling liquid was brought into my line of vision. I sat up and grabbed for it, drinking in a few gulps despite the fact that it burned my tongue. Only when I had sipped through half of the mug did I allow myself to glance up at the devil who'd woken me. He looked the same as ever, longish brown hair mostly covered by his forehead protector/bandana and a senbon balancing precariously on his lips. It was hard to imagine that he used to intimidate me. They all had, him and Raido and Kakashi; they all used to be bigger than me too. The only thing that hadn't changed was that they could all hold their alcohol. Figures. Of course I'd always be the lightweight.

"Go away if you want me to actually get up and get dressed," I muttered darkly as I set down the mug.

"Yeah, yeah," said Genma, waving a hand as he went to go sharpen his knives on my couch or something.

I forced myself up and out of bed. The only way to get rid of Genma would be to do an hour's worth of sparring or jogging with him, then convince him that we both had somewhere else to be. One hour, I could manage that no matter how hungover I was. Hell, I'd gone on more than one mission with a hangover. Not the best way to instill confidence in people, but we do what we do to get through the day. A life lesson from ANBU. Either you get sadistic and crazy like Kakashi or you drink. I didn't have quite the reputation to pull off crazy, so drinking it was and hangovers I had.

Genma decided to be nice since he _had_ been one of those who ditched me at the bar last night, so we ran instead of sparring. The run was actually quite nice and after the first ten minutes, we started to catch up with each other about the events of our past week. Genma had moved in with Mai, a civilian woman he'd started seeing a few months ago, and everything seemed to be going smoothly so far. Raido had given him shit about it, but then he'd been invited over for Mai's cooking and decided that as long as he could eat there once a week, he'd never mention another word about it. Yugao also had an open invitation to visit with them; she seemed to be getting a lot better about Hayate, even though she'd never really be the same again. (Genma had taken Hayate's death hard as well and the two of them had actually become good friends through it; she was perhaps Genma's only female friend that he'd never try to sleep with). Other than that, not much was new since we'd sparred last week.

I told him about Naruto's training, Sakura's being actually downright terrifying at times, and Sai's oddness but willingness to learn how to be human again.

"Sounds a bit like someone I know," snickered Genma at my description of Sai.

I shot him a half-serious glare. "At least he's learning from Naruto and Sakura who want him to be normal. I decided that an unstable sadist was my hero."

"Speaking of whom, how is our beloved captain? How is it to be working with him again?"

"He's, well, him. Still teases me endlessly, but he did get me home last night before I really would have had trouble. Working with him again is going surprisingly well. I think being around Naruto has grounded him a bit more. It seems like he's on the same plane of consciousness now, if you get what I'm saying."

"Ha, yeah, that's a good way to describe it. His mind was definitely living somewhere else when he was in ANBU. I'm glad the genin-sitting has done him well." Genma seemed amused but sincere.

"I guess it could be worse, though they are all technically chuunins now, with the exception of Naruto."

"Right, right, but we know that doesn't count for anything."

"Yeah," I said, sighing a little. We fell into a comfortable silence for a few minutes, nothing but the sound of our breathing and the pounding of our feet on the ground.

"Can I ask you something?" Genma started as we passed our ¾ mark.

"Sure," I said, slightly taken aback by him asking, usually he just went for it.

"You and Kakashi. There were rumors a while back, when we were in ANBU, you were like his puppy…?" I waited for an actual question to come. I did appreciate Genma's hesitation though, it proved he had a moral conscious hidden in there somewhere.

"I remember," I said when it was clear he was waiting for a response. "What about it?"

"Were they true?"

"Which ones?"

"Any of them?"

"Maybe some"

"Well, duh, which ones?"

As much as I enjoyed keeping Genma on the line like this, I figured I should probably give him a straight answer at some point, he was not the type of man to continue pressing questions without finding some way to get the answers, and I wasn't going to be in the mood for a fight after our run. So I sighed and considered which truth to give him. Usually I was good at steering conversations with anyone away from Kakashi, but Genma had more of a right to know the truth than anyone else.

"He was my first," I said in my most casual, matter of fact tone.

Genma's jaw dropped.

"You're fucking with me. First what? First senpai? First death battle? First friend?"

I slowed enough to look at him dead-on, partly so he would know I was telling him the truth but mostly so he would never bring this up again. Ever.

"First friend, first hug, first kiss, first sex."

"Damn, Yamato." Genma wheezed out. That was actually kind of enjoyable for me, it wasn't often that I could shock the man into using so few words. I knew he wouldn't stop it there for long though, so I took some liberties in only telling him parts of the story. Enough so he'd shut up, but not more than I could handle sharing. There was still a lot of it that I didn't really want to think about.

"You know how I came to the Third's ANBU, of course he was my first friend. You also know we did a few partner missions, with just the two of us. There were some late nights, some painful moments. I let him in more than I was really comfortable with, he did the same in return. We hugged, fell asleep leaning on each other a few times. The closer we got as friends, the more natural it became to touch each other. I was scared to try things, he didn't want me to get hurt. One night we drank a little, got a little closer, and it turned out not to be a huge leap to make from hugging to kissing, from kissing to sex. The alcohol made that leap seem more like a shuffling step, so that contributed a lot. Sex started happening every so often on late nights returning from missions. He went on a couple solo missions, came back, and wasn't interested anymore. We dropped it. That was it. Couldn't have lasted more than two months at most." More or less the truth. I wasn't about to tell Genma that I had been Kakashi's first too, or that we actually slept together every night (sex or no) for those 2 months, or that Kakashi had completely freaked and requested those solo missions to get away from me. That information was not necessary.

"Damn. And we had no idea."

Nope, we'd been careful.

"Why tell me this now?" He asked after we'd stopped completely so I could let him absorb the information.

I shrugged, stretching, "working with him again has made me remember being a teenager around him. He also won't quit calling me Tenzo, which doesn't help. So, you asked, and you're my friend. That's what has been on my mind. Friends share things like that."

"Yeah," Genma sighed, "I guess they do." He thought for a minute, I could see the cogs in his brain as he continued processing, so I started running again, slowly though because it wasn't my intention to just leave him in the dust.

"Wait a minute," he said, sounding confused as he caught up to me, "does that mean you're both gay?" He didn't sound appalled by the idea, just puzzled as if he couldn't figure out how he didn't know that two men he'd spent a significant number of years with could have been attracted to men instead of the women that they picked up at bars.

"I'm not really sure," I said sighing, "I find just as many women attractive as I do men, which honestly isn't that many on either side. And I can't speak for Kakashi, but I think he's in the same boat."

"Huh," he grunted as we picked up the pace and finished our last 15 minutes back into the village in a comfortable silence. I didn't worry about him spreading the information, I don't think he really cared that much, and he wouldn't want to ruin either of our reputations.

"Isn't this stuff supposed to be, like, emotionally scarring? Childhood abuse or something?" He asked, looking kind of unsure if it was ok to even ask me that. I considered the question, I think emotional scarring was kind of a guarantee the minute I'd been kidnapped and brought to Orochimaru's lab, the weeks I'd been locked in there alone before Danzo found me by pure coincidence.

"I wouldn't know," I shrugged.

"Yeah, I guess not," he said quietly. The he seemed to shake himself. "Until next Friday then, kid," Genma said his expression clearing, and clapping my back. "Good luck with the remainder of that hangover and your foxy friend." I hoped he was referring to Naruto. I knew I'd done all that talking about Kakashi on my own, but still I scowled at his retreating back. Thanks for starting my hangover day just right. Jerk.


	3. Chapter 3

"He's really going at it today," Kakashi murmured after we got Naruto set up with his waterfall for the day's training. I said nothing but braced my left forearm with my right hand so that I could hold my position longer.

"You're pretty hungover, aren't you?" He asked as he noted my lack of response. No shit.

"Yes, actually, Senpai, yes I am," I retorted, dryly sarcastic.

"You didn't drink the water I left for you, did you?" He was less asking and more accusing yet unsurprised.

"I woke up to it being dumped on my head with the addition of some ice cubes," I muttered frowning at the memory. "So, no, the chance to drink it was lost."

"Why would someone dump ice water on you this morning?" Damn, too much information. I didn't want to tell Kakashi about my run/talk with Genma this morning. So, I just stayed silent and focused on relaxing my shoulders, they were going to hurt like hell from tension after a couple hours of this.

"Lovers' quarrel?" He prodded further.

"Like I'd talk to _you_ about that," I said in a low voice, half-hoping he didn't hear me but knowing that he would. The talk earlier had unfortunately reminded me of how hurt I had been when Kakashi had disappeared without explanation all those years ago. I could still respect him as an incredible shinobi, but he was really quite horrible at being a friend.

"You get way too moody when you're hungover, Tenzo," He sighed lightly in 'defeat,' pulled out his favorite pornographic book, and retreated back to lying on the bench I had made for him. I kept myself from rolling my eyes and returned my attention to relaxing my position.

A few hours into the training, my hangover had receded in my head and was turning its misery forces over to the rest of my body. Sitting still for hours with my arms stretched out was not comfortable by any power of the imagination. I rolled my shoulders a little and let my neck hang forward, backward, to the sides.

"Break time!" Sang out Kakashi's chipper voice. At first I thought he was taking pity on me or Naruto looked near death, but then I saw the messenger hawk circling the sky right above us. I waited until Naruto had dispelled his clones and stumbled to pass out on the grass before I relaxed my stance.

"You're off to see the Hokage, Senpai?" I asked as I felt Kakashi's presence near me.

"Yeah, keep an eye on him and make sure he eats." He glanced me over quickly, but fully, I felt the pressure of his gaze. "You should lie down for a bit too, or ask Sakura to massage your shoulders," he added as the other two members of Team 7 made their presence known. Before I could respond, he appeared by her side, murmured something quietly enough that I couldn't hear, then disappeared on the spot. Sakura came up to my side.

"Kakashi-sensei said you needed a massage, and also that your head may be bothering you," she said gently. I liked Sakura a lot, not in any special way, just knowing that she could kill me with one finger as easily as it could heal me was pretty incredible. She was also somehow both forceful and unassuming about offering medical help. Which is why I agreed to let her banish my last remaining dregs of hangover as well as rub my shoulders and the base of my neck for a few minutes.

"Thanks, Sakura, that does feel much better." I smiled at her, then we went to make sure Naruto had a pulse.

"How is the training going?" Sakura asked me once she assured herself that Naruto was only sleeping exhaustion off.

"It's coming, he's managed to split the waterfall almost halfway through."

"That's good," she smiled, "I'm trying out a new recipe for my special soldier pills, so hopefully they won't taste as bad." She added this sheepishly, I laughed. Thank goodness, the original ones were quite frankly disgusting, I was just glad I hadn't been the one to tell her so. "Any idea why the Hokage summoned Kakashi-sensei?"

"Actually, no, I don't," I said, she raised an eyebrow at the tone of surprise in my voice. "He almost seemed to be expecting it. I guess I should have been too, but I figured with him only recently being out of the hospital, she wouldn't be rushing to send him on any missions too soon."

"That makes sense," she said, sounding a bit curious, "I wonder if it's a mission for all of us."

"Naruto would be disappointed to interrupt his training, I think I would welcome it though," I said, not bothering to suppress a grin. "It would be nice to have a break from sitting." To illustrate my point I did some stretches for the next few minutes while we waited for Kakashi's return.

Two hours. There is no way a mission briefing with Tsunade-sama lasted two hours. I don't think the woman is even capable of sitting still for two hours. Kakashi definitely isn't, unless he's got his nose stuck in one of those damn books. Naruto had slept for an hour, eaten, slept a little more, then proceeded to loudly complain about getting back to training. After about 5 minutes of the complaining, I caved. I was the one in charge of the fox, and since Naruto had his task, Kakashi really did nothing but lay around and read Icha Icha. So, I went back to my sitting position, Naruto went back to training, Sai was drawing at the edge of the field, and Sakura had disappeared. All of us duly frustrated in our own ways. Well, maybe not Sai, but who knows with him. Even I, who was once in an uncomfortably familiar situation to him, couldn't fully get a read on his thoughts.

"Yo." The voice was unnervingly close without my having noticed a presence. Damn, too many thoughts distracting me. And being mad at the owner of this voice for making me put up with Naruto's complaints.

"You have a solo mission," I said it as a statement. In our ANBU days, a long meeting with the Hokage generally meant a solo mission. A briefing never took 2 hours, but, maybe they'd had other matters to discuss. I felt a little more forgiving now that the man was actually here.

"Of a sort, I leave in the morning." Damn, I could really only handle these kids for so long, it would have been nice to get a break from them if the whole team had been assigned a mission.

Kakashi disappeared from my side and reappeared by the waterfall next to Naruto, all the Narutos jumped in excitement at whatever Kakashi promised to teach him on his return and then loudly exclaimed that they would cut the waterfall before dusk. Oh good grief, it would be a long afternoon.

Once Mr. Precious Silver Hair got back to my ring of wooden dragons, I decided I should probably ask what would happen with Naruto's training while he was gone.

"You know, I'd appreciate you watching over all my students. I know you're more than capable of handling them." He shot a boisterous eye smile my way along with his answer.

I scowled. As soon as he'd made this sound like a request of me instead of an order to me, I couldn't refuse. Especially when he added some pseudo-genuine praise on top of it. That bastard still remembered all of my buttons.


	4. Chapter 4

The rest of the training was uneventful. Kakashi left immediately, Sai left eventually, Naruto had still only gotten through half of the waterfall. I was ready to fall on my bad and pass out for as many hours as possible. Not looking forward to the 2 weeks Kakashi would be gone on his mission, I decided that tomorrow, Saturday, would be a day of rest and preparation for spending an ungodly amount of hours alone with Naruto. Basically all it meant was that I would sleep all day and Naruto would eat enough ramen to fill a tank. The kid had only agreed to a day off of training because he was dazed with hunger and I taunted him with a bowl from Ichiraku. Never let it be said that I learned nothing about persuasion from my previous captain.

Sufficiently happy with myself for leaving Naruto safely passed out on his bed, I made my way to my own apartment. Not a minute after I face-planted onto my bed, I felt the protection seals at my front door taken down. I didn't bother to hide my groan.

"Hey there, Nymph!" It wasn't an overly enthusiastic greeting, it was just an acknowledgement that someone was inviting himself into my house. I turned to my bedroom door and waited for Laori to appear.

Laori's dark-haired head and deeply-tanned face peeked in through the doorway. He was my most recent ANBU teammate and had a tendency to stay at my apartment whenever he had a woman in his bed who he didn't particularly want to wake up to in the morning (which happened far more often than either of us liked to admit). He also had a habit of giving people nicknames, like how we referred to Kakashi's students as the Pups since Kakashi himself had always been Hound. He usually greeted me as Nymph or sometimes Wood Sprite, pretty self-explanatory names.

"You look like shit," Laori continued in the same matter-of-fact voice.

"I feel like shit," I responded. "You staying the night?"

"Yeah, Anko is definitely not one to fuck and cuddle, but she was asleep, so I scrammed."

"Sounds reasonable. You do her quite often, is it true that the crazy have better sex?" I wasn't actually interested, but I felt the need to have some sort of conversation.

"Mmhmm, more kink, especially Lady Serpent," he still sounded bored, but I didn't doubt what he said. I grimaced as I tried not to picture it in my head. "You up for some poker?"

I didn't have training tomorrow, I could sleep the whole day. "Yeah, why not?" I said, rolling myself over to get off my bed.

I followed Laori to my living room and pulled a couple decks of cards out from a drawer in my coffee table while Laori ambled in to the kitchen to get us a couple beers and the bag of carrots.

"Fuck, Nymph, what happened to the carrots?" he shouted across the apartment at me.

"Oh, I think I had some in my soup the other night. How many are left?"

Laori ambled into the living room and held up the bag, a single eyebrow raised. 4 big carrots. I considered for a moment and then took the bag from him and went back into the kitchen to cut them. After they were cut into 40 pieces, we settled on the floor in front of the coffee table with 20 carrot pieces and a beer each.

Don't ask me how we started using carrots as our gambling chips, but it happened. And this way we lost a lot less money, so pass no judgments. It's really just proof of how much we gamble.

"Five card draw?" I asked, shuffling.

"Sure."

"You deal," I passed the deck to him.

As usual, we played until either one person had all the carrots, I got pass-out drunk, or one of us just fell asleep. When it was only the two of us playing, the third option occurred most often. That night, it was me who fell asleep sprawled on my couch. And Laori who cleaned up and slept on my bed.

_"Hey, Tenzo?" The question was murmured softly as though trying not to wake me, but the owner of the voice definitely knew I was awake._

_ "Yeah?" I whispered back, turning to face him in the dark of our little shelter. Even in the pitch blackness of the night, the moon would peak through and catch the glimmer of unshed tears in the young silver-haired captain's mismatched eyes. It had been a difficult mission, not because of strength or skill, but because so many innocent lives were endangered and many of them would not survive. _

_ "Can I… hold you? These words were even softer than his initial question. He sounded nervous, but he shouldn't have been. I would never refuse him. He was my best friend, my confidant (when I had anything to confide), and recently, he'd become impossibly more. He'd become an extension of myself. Someone who needed to be held, someone who I could hold on to. It was a new experience for me, something I never could have imagined. He became always, unimaginably _there_, like a dream. I was beginning to define this incredible feeling, this wonderful bond, as trust. I trusted him. I thought he trusted me. _

_ I shifted quietly so as not to wake our teammates, and moved myself next to him._

_ "I'd like that," I pressed my lips close to his ear and could feel his smile on my cheek. I smiled in return and his arms wrapped around me, pulling me close into his warmth. I snuggled into it, knowing that just having me there was helpful to him. Just having him there was helpful to me too. _

_ "Thank you, Tenzo."_

I scowled when I woke up. I hated those damn dreams coming back to haunt me as they were wont to do of late. Stupid Kakashi and his uncertainties. They left me mad at Kakashi, but they also left me craving that warmth again. I rarely ever admitted to myself how much I missed it. Sure, I'd slept with other people, men and women, and they'd slept in my bed after sex, but it wasn't the same. For some unthinkable reason, the only person who my body had chosen to bond with was pretty much unavailable in every way possible. And no amount of other lovers could take his place. Fuming, I stalked to my bathroom in need of a frighteningly cold shower.

I tied a towel around my waist and glanced into my bedroom, Laori was already gone, which I was actually glad about, I wanted my day of rest to be 100% mine. I spent a few hours lounging on my couch, a few hours cleaning, a couple hours doing laundry, an hour grocery shopping and chatting with whatever jounin I ran into, an hour cooking, and then it was time for a few hours of lounging on my couch again before bed. I'd managed to get all my weekly house-chores done, enough rest to at last at least another week of Naruto, and as a bonus, I'd forgotten my Kakashi dream. All in all, a good day. I set my alarm for 7AM and snuggled into my bed for a good night's rest.

It's only on the nights that I don't drink that I realize how much better the sleep is. And then I think to myself that I should stop drinking altogether just to feel this benefit. But then I think one beer won't do me any harm, which turns into 2 beers, inevitably becoming 3, etc. Anyway, the point of saying that was to say I had an excellent sleep the night before we were supposed to return to Naruto's training. Unfortunately, fate had other plans.

"Ah, Captain Yamato, just the person I was hoping to run in to!" Shizune exclaimed as she saw me leave my apartment building.

"Yes," I said jokingly, "what a shock that you should find me where I live." She looked frazzled for a minute, trying to figure out if I was making fun of her or something, before laughing lightly.

"Well, yes, I was looking for you, not just hoping to run into you. And I'm glad you're here. Tsunade-sama needs to see you immediately. She is sending for the rest of Team Kakashi as well."

"Alright, I'm heading directly to her office then. Thank you, Shizune," I offered her a smile and a wave before I teleported to the Hokage Tower. The poor woman was always running and more than once I'd wanted to ask her to join us at the bar or something to get her to relax. After seeing her taking care of a drunk Tsunade though, I'd decided that probably wasn't the best idea, and resorted to just being kind to her when I saw her.

I nodded to the ANBU guarding Tsunade-sama's office, I recognized both of them, of course, and their acknowledgment of me showed that they knew who I was as well. It didn't often happen, but it was kind of nice when it did. I pushed open the doors to find Sakura already in the office. Not surprising considering that she was Tsunade's apprentice.

"Is everything alright, Hokage-sama?" I asked, bowing lightly to her and nodding to Sakura.

"I'll explain the situation when the other two get here," she said, tapping her fingers in a slow, rhythmic pattern. I could tell she was pissed about something.

Naruto all but fell into the room a minute later, calmly followed by Sai, who was wearing the expression of a person who'd just had a particularly pleasant session of goading a reaction out of our favorite blond shinobi.

Tsunade cut to the chase immediately.

"Pakkun arrived early this morning requesting back up for Kakashi and Gai. Their mission was surveillance and action if necessary. Unfortunately, we did not expect that other villages would also be investigating this asset so soon. It seems our information source had his hands in many pockets. The asset is invaluable; however, we must stop it from entering another village's ownership at any cost, including its destruction. Here is the outline of the mission I gave the two of them, they will fill you in on the details, Pakkun will lead you to their current location." Well, now her annoyance was obvious. Any idiot leaking information to opposing villages should be executed. I was willing to bet Tsunade had already sent an ANBU assassination team to take care of it.

"Where's Pakkun?" Naruto asked from some corner of the room; I'm sure he started looking for that crazy pug the minute he'd heard his name. I was wondering the same thing, though, usually Pakkun liked to be present in mission briefings.

"Right here, kid," came the gruff voice of the small dog as he poofed into appearance on the corner of the Hokage's desk. "Pack your things, we leave in an hour." He disappeared in a cloud of smoke again. Not so weird that he didn't want to hang around. I waited until the Pups left before turning to Tsunade.

"Is it urgent?" I asked. Gai and Kakashi were two of the best shinobi of Konoha and I knew they tended to be oddly exceptional at partner missions.

Tsunade-sama just heaved a sigh and looked at me, her fingers stopped tapping.

"Kakashi seems to be having a difficult time controlling Gai's enthusiasm for hunting down the other villages' scouts. Urgent in ANBU terms? No, probably not. Urgent in whether Gai and Kakashi will kill each other? Almost definitely." She looked thoughtful for another moment, then laughed. "If it weren't an important mission when we're on the verge of a war, this situation would actually be rather funny." I laughed gently with her, I was sure our first arrival would indeed be hilarious, especially since it was bound to include an irate Kakashi. "You can go now, Yamato. Thank you," her fingers resumed tapping, but I knew I was dismissed, so I bowed and left the office.


	5. Chapter 5

A long chapter, but I reward your patience with some yaoi smut towards the end ;)

"Oi, Captain Yamato!" Naruto shouted, catching up to me as we bounded through the trees.

"Yes?" I asked, cautiously.

"I should really be training. Is there any way for me to continue my training while we're on this mission? I know it's important, but I have to master my wind nature. I have to!" The kid was so enthusiastic. I thought for a minute, then jumped to the ground and gathered some twigs.

"Asuma-san taught you that wind nature chakra cuts finer than a blade, right?" He nodded eagerly. "I want you to manipulate your chakra into a fine blade and direct it through the twigs. Throw the twigs one at a time and try to get them stuck in a tree trunk or cut all the way through a trunk. No shadow clones though, since I can't be entirely focusing on the kyuubi for this mission."

"Alright! I'll definitely get a twig to cut through one of these trees!" He exclaimed excitedly before turning to focus his chakra on a twig. I had to laugh a little, his devotion really was heart-warming.

It took us about 6 hours to reach Kakashi and Gai, I immediately picked up on both their chakra signatures as we got close and started scouting out a place to set up a little house. I loved my mission houses; I loved designing houses in general, it had become one of my hobbies in ANBU whenever I was injured and kept off missions. Plus, my mission houses were the best place to relay important mission information between new-coming comrades.

"AH, YOUTHFUL COMPANIONS! Not that you aren't Youthful, My Eternal Rival, but their Youth screams of Innocence and Purity of Soul!"

"Discrete! Gai, we are on a surveillance mission, which means quiet and silence and stillness…" I couldn't stifle a laugh, it was downright hilarious when Kakashi actually got ruffled enough to use his angry voice and even funnier when he used run-on sentences. I had learned over the years that Kakashi is very precise with what he says, even grammatically he abides by the rules. Run on sentences just make it much more obvious how annoyed he is.

Naruto and Sakura were enveloped in Gai's embrace, their faces almost immediately turning blue as both tried to wiggle out. Sai had somehow slipped away from it and was making notes in his little 'friendship' book, probably thinking 'perhaps I should have let myself be hugged too, that seems to be a tradition with this strange man.' Well, that's what I had been thinking as I first got acquainted with Gai anyway…

"Yo, Tenzo," Kakashi had turned up closer to me in an effort to get as far from Gai as possible. Pakkun landed between the two of us, greeted his master, Kakashi thanked him for his help, and then the gruff little pug was dismissed back to wherever summons go.

"It's Yamato, Senpai," I huffed, my amusement at Kakashi's anger slipping away.

"Right, right. I see you've built us a nice little house," he said nonchalant as ever.

"Do you like it, Senpai?" I asked, curious.

"Yeah, it'll do fine. Far enough away from the asset and prying eyes. It's small enough that I can set some simple genjutsu around it as well."

"Well, we should probably all go inside and be caught up on the mission."

"Could you set up another mission house, say, 5 miles from here, send a clone, and tell Gai we're meeting there?" Kakashi asked, slightly wistful. I could not hold back a shout of laughter at that one.

"Sorry, Senpai, we're stuck with him. You should be more grateful, he is a friend of yours, is he not?" I challenged lightly. He shot me a glare with that one visible eye.

"Gai is best taken in small doses with a shot of vodka. A friend perhaps, but not on a surveillance mission." I patted his shoulder and gave him a smaller, softer, more genuine smile.

"I know, we'll put him on first watch tonight and I'll make sure to wake up a little late." Before Kakashi responded to that, I called out to the rest of our group and invited them into the mission house.

"SUCH a Beautiful rendition of Natural space, Dear Yamato!" Gai complimented on my house, I shuffled my feet a bit and carefully didn't meet his gaze to receive any more attention.

"Thanks, Gai," I said, because I am a respectful shinobi and appreciate the compliments of others. Also, we all know that Gai is actually quite intelligent, he's just, well, crazier than most jounin (which is saying something).

"So," I started as soon as we all got comfortable in the upstairs room of the house. "Tsunade-sama said that this mission has gotten more complicated because there are more players lining up for control of a certain asset. We are not to allow any other villages to get said asset. That is basically all we know." I prompted for Kakashi. He considered this a moment before speaking.

"We are also currently unaware of what this asset actually is, but I am beginning to sense a set-up by this information source. He claimed that he had seen some sort of weapon which could assume power over whichever bijuu it came in contact with. Gai and I were sent to figure out what the asset was, observe its current position, determine whether it was safe to bring back to Konoha, or destroy it if it were too dangerous or unpredictable to be handled. We have seen members from at least 4 other villages and avoided direct contact with them. We are fairly positive they do not know that Konoha is also searching for the asset. None of the villages seem to be partnering with one another; in fact, they all seem to have been enemies with one another in previous wars. This is what leads me to believe there is a set up involved. It is entirely possible that a weapon exists, based on our knowledge of bijuu experimentation, but it is also possible this weapon is already in possession of the Akatsuki and they have sent warring villages to the same place on false information in the hopes that a skirmish will break out and kill otherwise valuable shinobi. A weapon of such great force requires each village to send select elite jounin, who would be a hassle in a war. However, we cannot simply abandon this mission if there is a chance that the asset is here and the information source was simply a man too greedy to serve only a single village." Kakashi stopped at this and looked around at us.

"What do you suggest we do, Senpai?" I asked.

"I think we should break into two smaller groups. Sai and I will search for the asset. He can send his scouting mice farther into the village than any of us would be able to do. Both of us are also capable of completely masking our chakra signatures, so we are more likely to pass as civilians if need be. Yamato, I want you to take command of the rest of our team. This forest is your element, spread your scouting seeds and find how many other shinobi we're facing. If a battle breaks out, avoid fighting if possible. If it is necessary, Sakura your primary duty will be as healer. If the asset truly exists, we will need the full extent of our powers to deal with it. Gai and Naruto have the greatest advantages as fighters against unknown villages since their strengths are to surprise people. Use that to your advantage." He glanced at the sky. "We will split up now and regroup here within an hour after nightfall. Understood?"

We all nodded in agreement. He narrowed his eyes between Gai and Naruto and practically hissed, "No unnecessary fights or chakra use, got it?"

"But of course, Eternal Rival, we shall retain our Youthful Flames until the true Battle of Justice calls!" Gai bellowed, though with a bit more restraint than his usual voice.

Kakashi turned his glare a Naruto, who held it for a minute before caving.

"Hai, Kakashi-sensei," he said reluctantly. He looked at me sullenly as Kakashi and Sai picked up their things. "That means no training, doesn't it, Captain Yamato?"

I smiled sadly at him and said, "yes, Naruto-kun, it does, but you can think of it as a different kind of training. Stealth training. It is also very important to being a shinobi, we'll have to teach you the basics of hiding your chakra and perhaps some scouting lessons." A little brightness returned to his eyes.

"Well, then, Yamato-san! What shall we do now? Jump through the Branches? Slither on the ground? Become one with Wind? …" I tuned him out for a moment as I gathered my chakra to make my scouting seeds. Then I interrupted him.

"Actually, Gai-san, I'm leaving Sakura in charge of watching the two of you for a moment while I spread my scouting seeds throughout the forest surrounding the village. It shouldn't take me more than an hour or two and I'll be back." I sent an apologetic look toward Sakura. Her lips pressed firmly together but otherwise looked like she would give either one a chakra-filled punch if they tried anything. "Thank you," I murmured as I passed her.

Spreading my seeds, no sexual pun intended, was actually quite nice. The breeze through the forest carried them far and wide. I knew several would probably be picked up by villagers, but as long as they didn't seem to be moving too suspiciously, I could cut my chakra connection with those seeds. After I'd made a complete circle around the outskirts of the village, I smiled and admired my handiwork, then gently reached out to see if any had been picked up yet.

None, but it was only a matter of time. I ran into no one from other villages, not even as I made my way quickly back to our base. I didn't think anything unusual of this, I had been masking my chakra and been careful to move ANBU-stealthily.

Nothing had changed at our mission house since I'd left. Gai and Naruto were debating about the two mission scrolls we had been given, while Sakura looked up from her medical supplies inventory.

"How did it go?" She asked.

"There were no problems. I can monitor my seeds from here and once I sense movement from any of the sections, I will alert all of you and we will follow it."

"Sounds like a plan," she said as she returned to her supplies.

The rest of the afternoon and evening went by without much event. Eight people stepped on my scouting seeds. Four we were convinced were common villagers. Two we deemed as suspicious villagers who seemed more like shinobi. And the final two we traced back to a small encampment of shinobi from an unidentifiable small hidden village.

When Kakashi and Sai returned, Gai was out in front of our mission house doing single-handed pushups with Naruto reading a scroll I found about stealth tracking sitting on his back. Sakura was doing some light training of her own on a tree nearby, practicing focusing her chakra without the use of her special black gloves.

I called my section of the team inside as we sat down to share intel. I told Kakashi quickly all we had found out was the unnamed village and that there were definitely shinobi setting up camp inside the village parameters. Kakashi nodded, as though he expected this and then motioned for Sai to explain what his mice had learned.

"There are many people who live on a large source of chakra. This chakra source is vital to all the villagers living around it. It provides them with life energy, nutrition, and even heals their bodies without them even noticing their injuries. It has become so ingrained in their lives that if it were to be destroyed or robbed, many of them would die and those who lived would be in need." I gasped, even Gai and Naruto looked at a loss for words. Sai continued, "The asset is a product of this chakra source, and it does indeed exist; however, taking it away from the source is impossible without killing the source. It is Kakashi-sensei's belief that the asset was created for the purpose of allowing the villagers to move away and live without the source, but it has not yet reached maturity. We believe that is why the hidden villages have chosen to strike now to try and kidnap it. The asset is a child." Sai finished. I knew I was barely breathing, I was sure no one else was doing too well either. No wonder Kakashi had chosen for Sai to speak, this was an extremely difficult situation for him. For all of us really. Kidnap a child and kill a village? Let another village do it?

"A child who can control bijuu?" said Sakura in a hoarse whisper.

"We do not know that it can control bijuu, but it is, without a doubt, a very powerful asset." Sai confirmed.

Needless to say, falling asleep that night was difficult. Gai took the first watch, sitting on the roof of our mission house. I tossed and turned several times before falling into a light, restless sleep. It could only have been a few hours later when something woke me completely. At first I thought it was the remnant of some dream, but then I recognized the low, tortured moans. Shit. Of course it would happen on such a terrible mission though.

I moved quickly and quietly to Kakashi's sleeping roll where he was already twitching violently. I fixed myself in a position behind him and braced myself for his next move. He sat straight up in his sleep, I lunged forward to clap my right hand over his mouth and placed my left hand firmly between his shoulder blades. His scream came muffled, I could feel his teeth sink into my hand as I knew the tang of my blood in his mouth triggered him to come half-aware from his dream state. He struggled against me, I pressed harder into his back with my left hand and leaned my face close to whisper in his ear.

"Shhh, Senpai, it's only me. It's just Tenzo. Breathe with me now. Deep breaths. In. Out. You're safe. I'm here. In. Out." I felt him relaxing and removed my right hand from his mouth, instead wrapping it firmly around his shoulders. My left hand also changed from a forceful push to a firm, but gentle rub down to the center of his back. I felt his breathing match mine as I kept whispering in his ear. Finally, I felt him sag forward slightly and his hands came up to hold onto my right arm. We sat there for a minute, quiet, letting our breaths mingle. He took a deeper breath and pulled my arm away from his shoulders to take a closer look at my hand.

"I'm sorry," he whispered hoarsely.

"It's ok, I'm glad I still have my Kakashi-nightmare super senses," I joked lightly.

"You always handle it just right, you know," he said this so quietly, I pressed my left hand into his back to let him know that I'd heard it. He pulled away from me for a moment before returning with some antiseptic solution and bandaging. He poured the solution on my hand, wrapped it, and tied the bandaging carefully.

"Thank you, Tenzo," he said, turning his head to look back at me. I felt like I was 18 again, my senpai looking back at me. Thanking me for being a good friend, kissing me softly on the lips, letting our arms wrap around each other. He had the same vulnerable eyes now that he did then. I think that's why I did it, I couldn't deny those eyes. I barely had to move at all and his mask was already down. I pressed my lips onto his. The first time in several years. They were soft, warm, and wet. I felt myself sigh, my whole body trembled, it had been so long. So fucking long, Kakashi.

Without much hesitation, Kakashi was returning the kiss, deepening it by parting his lips. I let my tongue slide inside his mouth, tasting the light tang of my blood from when he bit my hand. Odd knowing that, but so so nice to have my tongue back in Kakashi's mouth. He let me take the lead and explore his mouth for any changes, the teeth were a little sharper, the taste a little more bitter though that may have been because we were eating dehydrated bars as mission food. After a moment of my exploration, I relented and flicked my tongue across his to let him know he was welcome to my mouth. His tongue traced my lips, outside and inside, ran along my teeth, the roof of my mouth. Ah, his hand had moved at some point to my lower back, pressing me a just the right point to bring me closer to him and arouse me as if the kiss hadn't already started that. He moaned lightly as my hand caressed the side of his face, pulling on an earlobe gently. The sound made me realize what we were doing. And _where_ we were.

"Shit," I gasped, pulling away from him. "Don't _do_ that, Senpai."

"You started it," he replied, the sarcasm lost its bite in his breathlessness.

I stretched out my chakra for a minute, searching for Gai. Found him, front of the mission house. Good. There was a back door. I untangled myself from Kakashi and walked out of the room. I heard his footsteps behind me.

As soon as we were out the back door, I caught him between my arms and shoved him into the outside wall next to the door. If he followed me all the way out here, he was asking for it.

Our lips smashed together again, much more hungry and needy than the relatively innocent kiss moments earlier. We fought a brief moment for dominance, but there was no way he was going to take this from me. I won. My tongue ravished his mouth, needing, taking, leaving us both breathless. His hands had settled to grip on my waist. I pressed him harder against the wall, his grip tightened. I could already feel that a bruise would form there by morning. Well, if he was going to mark me, guess it was my right to mark him.

I pulled his mask down far enough so that my mouth could reach the crook of his neck. And I sucked, deep and thorough. He moaned and ground his hips into mine. Urging me to just do this, move faster, stop teasing. Fuck, it felt amazing. It had been way too long since I'd seen and felt Kakashi release his control like this. Even when we were sleeping together, he didn't do it often. So, of course that meant I was going to use this to my full advantage.

I formed a couple hand seals quickly and soon his wrists were manacled to the walls. He was mine. At least for a while. He growled and strained against them, I shut him up with another hard kiss and let my hands snake up under his shirt to rub his nipples, press into his lower back, drag slowly up and down his sides. His strain turned into shudders, his growl into whimpers. I smiled, he was done fighting for now. Excellent.

I returned my mouth to his neck, teasing the sensitive spots gently with my tongue, while one hand moved to just below the waistband of his pants. I pressed my hand hard into the skin just above his hard erection. He twitched and groaned, trying to move his hips to encourage my hand just a fraction lower. I wasn't having any of it. I pressed harder and nibbled on his earlobe. I felt his whole body respond, shaking with arousal, small sounds tearing from his mouth. I slid down to my knees and peeled his pants down just enough to release his beautiful cock. I moved my mouth over him, careful not to let any part touch that throbbing heat, and brought my hands down to hold his hips firmly place. He was definitely one to thrust into my mouth if I wasn't careful, and I was in no mood to go easy on him tonight.

I stretched my mouth to cover as much of his erection as possible without letting lips, tongue, or cheeks anyway near the taut skin. I breathed deeply in through my nose, then let the breath rush out, over him, in a warm gust. He bucked hard against my hands, a deep gasping growl wrenched from deep in his throat. I kept him still, and pulled my mouth away from him, glancing up. His eyes were closed, his face drawn in tortured lust, his whole body quivering in anticipation of what I would do next.

"_Fuck_, _Tenzo,_" he was barely daring to breathe.

I touched my tongue teasingly to his slit, already starting to drip pre-cum. He moaned, fists clenching. Oh _yes_. I had him so fucking good. I felt my own groin tighten and I knew I would be painfully hard by the end of this; I was already pretty solid down there. It was time to give him a little satisfaction.

I pulled him as far into my mouth as possible and let my tongue trace the base of him, along his shaft. The noises he made became background music, his attempts at thrusting easy enough to restrain with one hand so I could use the other to contribute to my blow job. I let my mouth release him, bit by bit, leaving a trail of saliva along his cock, before I moved my hand down to tighten around his base, pumping him slowly while I sucked on his balls.

Once I'd had sufficient fun there, I stopped the pumping of my hand and let it fix to rotating tightly around his base, while I took his head back into my mouth. I teased with my tongue at first, running it strong along his shaft, flicking his tip easily. Finally, I started sucking, my hand at his base tightening and rotating increasingly faster in rhythm with my mouth's movements.

"Ahhh, hahh, fuuu, grhh, haaaa…" I registered Kakashi's unintelligible groans now as I let myself fall into my blow job completely. I loved hearing those noises, another sign of just how far gone he was. Just how much _I_ had made him lose control. When a real word came out, it was a warning, just my name. I could already feel his build up though. His stomach muscles tightening, his breathing even more shallow and ragged, his cock twitching despite all the pressure I had surrounding it. He came hard in hot spurts in my mouth, his orgasm so strong I felt it reverberate through my own body. _Yes._ My erection started throbbing for its own release.

I pulled away slightly, cleaned off my mouth with the back of hand, and released the manacles. Kakashi actually fell, sliding down the wall, unable to hold himself up. It was fucking hot to see him still shaking.

I sat beside him and pulled him into my arms. I could feel his nerves on fire, racing through his body. I pulled him tighter, held him closer, trying to ignore the insistence of my erection. Kakashi took a couple of deep full breaths, before he worked a big glob of saliva onto one hand. His other pulled my pants down, releasing me. I let myself smile, even after a knee-weakening orgasm, Kakashi wanted to get me off too. At least that hadn't changed.

One hand pumped me slowly, spreading the saliva all over my length. Then another hand joined. I closed my eyes and leaned back against the wall to enjoy this. The hands twisted, squeezed, rubbed over my head, pulled at my foreskin, laid strong pressure along my shaft. No teasing, just hot, strong, thorough pressure. I had been leaking pre-cum as soon as my pants were down, I was already at the edge, seeing spots in my vision.

" 'Kashi…" I mumbled, amidst my moaning with sensation. His head ducked down just in time to wrap his mouth around my head as my body tensed with my own incredible orgasm.


	6. Chapter 6

I came back to reality again after a minute or four. Kakashi was snuggled up into my chest, breathing slow and even, already asleep in my arms. At first it was nice, I recognized the way I was looking at him. It was the same way Genma and Mai looked at each other, the same gaze that had existed between Hayate and Yugao. Love. But then I remembered something. My love was one-sided. The man sleeping against my chest didn't love me, couldn't love me, and probably would never be able to love me. He could choose to leave me just as easily as he had done in ANBU; he could disappear from my life as quickly now as he did then. The pain of this realization and memory, especially after what we'd just shared, was deep enough to take my breath away. My chest tightened and I couldn't breathe. Of course he would leave me. What could I offer him? What made me special enough for him to look beyond the sex? Why should he allow himself to feel something for lowly old _me_? I was nothing, a lightweight alcoholic, a vegetable gambler, a fake copy of the First Hokage, an angry lazy slob. Nothing important. Especially not to him.

I knew he had his own issues, his own horrific past, but the way he treated me after I told him I was falling in love with him clearly meant he wasn't even remotely interested in repairing his broken emotions. He spoke of the importance of friends, yet as soon as I'd offered him everything, he had run. If it was from a fear of relationships, he would have come back. He would have eventually let me in again, right? I'd said we could go slow, I'd never felt this way before, I just wanted him near me all the time, to be able to approach him whenever I needed comfort or hug him when I could see fear in his eyes. I'd offered myself to him in any way that he wanted me: a friend, a lover, a sex partner, anything that would let me be on good terms with him. He'd refused them all and reverted quickly to his teasing, closed-off self. It had felt as though he was making fun of me. As if he'd wanted me to fall for him just so he could hurt me later. As if it were all just part of a sick bet. I expected others to prey on my inexperience with the outside world, but never him. He meant too much to me from the beginning. My worries seemed unfortunately all too possible. Everyone else made fun of me in some way, why shouldn't Kakashi take his turn? And because he was the famous Copy-Nin, of course his should have the best prank, effect the most damage, push me the most forcefully into my rightful place at the bottom rung.

All the feelings of that time rushed into my head and my heart. I pushed Kakashi roughly off of me and stood up.

"Tenzo?" He asked, blearily confused, half-waking up. "What's wrong?" As if he cared.

I just walked away from him and opened the back door. I turned back to say one thing.

"Fuck you." My carefully sewn-up heart broke into its old pieces. I slammed the door behind me.

As I made my way back up to our sleeping room though, I couldn't stop myself from looking out the window, back down at him. He'd moved, his knees pulled into his chest, arms wrapped around them, plume of silver hair sticking out of the little ball he'd curled himself into. I felt another deep ache, a desire to run back down and wrap his fragile body back into my arms. I might have, too, if I didn't hear my name whispered in the dark.

"Captain Yamato, is everything alright?" A soft, gentle voice, the moonlight caught a strand of pink hair.

"Yes Sakura, Kakashi-senpai and I just wanted to talk through some strategy without waking you all up," I said, the lie coming easily from my mouth. She nodded as if this made sense and shifted back into sleep.

I laid down on my own sleeping roll, knowing full well that the post-orgasm lull was not coming to me tonight. Kakashi would take guard in an hour to let Gai rest; I would take the guard a few hours later so Kakashi and Sai could head to the village before a majority of the civilians woke up. I didn't want to face him again. Not for as long as possible.

I squeezed my eyes shut and forced myself to think happy thoughts. My friendships with Genma, Laori, Raido, Yugao, a multitude of other ANBU teammates. I had filled the empty space from Kakashi with all of them. Genma's teasing had surprisingly always been the most tame when I first started at ANBU, he had been the first to help heal my heart even if he hadn't realized it. Raido followed a close second. Laori's near-constant presence in my life for the last several years filled a lot of my loneliness. Yugao was one I could always call on for dinner if I needed a distraction, she talked philosophy and was excellent at dragging my mind from angst-y places. I had people, they were good to me, they cared for me, and that was important.

I drifted in and out of sleep enough to feel slightly refreshed and semi-ready to relieve Kakashi of guard duty. I stretched out my chakra to find him perched on the roof. I took a deep, calming breath and went up to meet him.

"Hey, Senpai," I said gently, making sure my footsteps were also loud enough across the roof so I wouldn't startle him.

"Yo," he replied, as though a few hours ago never happened. I guess that was easier anyway, not like I wanted to talk about it at all. There was a question in his eye as he turned to look at me. I had no idea what it was and decided to ignore it.

"Anything I should be keeping an eye on?" I asked, sitting a polite distance away from him but still close enough to carry a quiet conversation.

He hesitated before answering; I could feel his eye watching me.

"I'm sorry. For everything I've done to make you say that," he said, barely above a whisper. I shifted uncomfortably at the apology, he doesn't make those often. I also still did not want to talk about it now.

"You hurt me. A lot. It's over. We move on," my sentences came out short and clipped, trying to convey my desire to him.

"I know, I was horrible to you." I glared at him.

"Yes, Senpai."

"I'm sorry." I sensed that he was waiting for me to say something forgiving, that he wanted me to be closer to him than I was. He wouldn't apologize more than once if he wasn't waiting for a certain response. I couldn't do it. I felt icy.

"So, is there anything I need to focus on in the near future for the safety of our team or the sake of our mission?" I asked again, elaborating my initial question to make sure he got the point. Kakashi stood, walked over to me, leaned down, and breathed in my ear.

"Please be careful." And then he was gone. I let the shiver run down my back. When was I not careful? And he had no right to get up in my personal space like that. I crossed my arms over my chest and let myself pout for a few minutes before remembering I was actually supposed to be guarding my teammates.

A short one, I know, and not exactly happy, but I'll have something good to make up for it this weekend!


	7. Chapter 7

I know, after Tenzo going all angsty on Kakashi, you guys probably want me to get right back to them. But, I have to actually solve the whole mission crisis they had in chapter 5 before I can go back to that. So if you don't really care about that, you can skip this chapter, and I should have chapter 8 up by tomorrow since it is easier for me to write their interactions than mission-jumble...

I watched the sunrise from the top of my roof, and shortly after felt a tugging from another one of my scouting seeds. Time to wake Gai and the Pups. If they weren't already awake, I amended, hearing shouts about Youth coming from inside. This would be a long day.

"Oi, I've got movement on a seed," I said, jumping in through the window. "It looks like it's heading toward that camp we saw yesterday, let's get a move on."

"Of Course! We must Excel in the Endeavors of Trailing our Fellow Youthful Shinobi!" Gai bounded out of our house, "Come Delightful Captain, Lead Us Forth!" He gave his 'good guy' pose and his teeth had me momentarily blinded. I sighed and followed him out, long freaking day ahead.

I lead the trail while Gai and Naruto followed closely, Sakura at the very back, but not very far behind. I let my chakra pull me closer, even as I recognized the surroundings. This was definitely the same camp we came across yesterday. I held up my hand to stop the others.

"What is it? Why are we stopping?" Naruto whined.

Sakura knocked him relatively lightly across the head, "Baka! Don't you recognize this place?"

"Be quiet!" I hissed, before Gai could contribute anything louder. I looked down into the little encampment. It almost looked like it had grown overnight. There were a couple more tents and I could feel three distinctly different chakra signatures from my scouting seeds. Odd, it was like more than one village's representatives were here. Maybe they were combing forces to destroy the rest?

"There are at least four different villages there, Captain Yamato," Sakura whispered, appearing closer to my side. "I recognize four medic-nin uniforms, so there may even be more."

"I'm going to send a clone down to investigate." I made the hand seals and a wood clone stepped away from my body. We watched pseudo-me bound down into the little camp. I pressed my fist to my face plate and waited for the clone to make conversation that I could listen in to. Most of the time I used my face plate as radio communication between my clones and myself, but by extending just slightly more chakra, I could hear everything that happened as if it were the real me standing there.

"All of us are staying here and silent while my clone does his work. I know you don't like it, but we need to figure out what is going on here." I explained, seeing the cluelessness on Naruto's face and just knowing the exuberance of Gai. I waited until all three nodded before turning my attention back to my clone.

Pseudo-me approached the camp carefully, but making noise to alert the shinobi in the area of his presence. Finally one looked up, quickly followed by the others near him.

"Who's there? What do you want?" A good sign. Shinobi who were going to kill or already had specific orders in place would not question a foreign presence; they would act immediately and question the captive later.

"I come in peace and curiosity. This camp does not follow the normal rules of shinobi on a mission. I wonder if you also question the ethics of the mission many of us were sent here to complete." Pseudo-me stated, wanting to be honest and complete in his explanations.

"You also know the decision we are all faced with?"

"Yes."

"How?" His voice sharpened threateningly.

"Members of my team were able to gain information from the village yesterday, enough to know the extent of how difficult this mission is." Pseudo-me continued.

"You are the captain of your squad?"

"Yes." People did not trust non-captains, besides I knew if joining this encampment meant not having to kill innocent people, Kakashi would play along.

"You are also of sound mind, not wanting to cause death or innocents being taken advantage of?" This was a new voice, female. She continued, "I am the leader of this camp, we are 6 villages strong now and we are currently taking any other possible scenarios than the ones presented to us. If you agree, we would like to grant a meeting with your team."

"I am a clone of Captain Yamato of Konoha, I will communicate will allow my real self and my team to come forth now. They will appear from the forest directly behind me." Pseudo-me said confidently.

I motioned for Gai, Naruto, and Sakura to walk with me as we aimed for the area my clone had pointed out. As we appeared, I dispelled the jutsu. The kunoichi who had been standing in front of Pseudo-me came toward us.

"Captain Anjri of the Village Hidden in the Stream. We have been extending efforts for the past two days to find like-minded shinobi who do not want unnecessary sacrifice of innocents especially before a war that will require all of our strength." She spoke righteously and confident; she knew she was doing the right thing, in spite of whatever orders the commander of her village had given.

"I am Captain Yamato of Konoha, these are my subordinates: Maito Gai, Uzumaki Naruto, and Haruno Sakura. Two of my others are currently still gathering intel from the village. I will introduce them upon their later arrival." I said, as I indicated each of my companions.

"Very well," she said, "we will be starting a meeting shortly in the largest tent." She indicated one to the far side of the camp, it was hidden well among the trees. "You are all welcome to join. Captain Yamato, we invite you to share your intel with us now, we will tell you if we know of any different." She started walking towards the tent.

"Meet in the large tent as soon as it seems apparent the rest of the camp is headed there. Stay together, don't let your guards down, find out as much information as you can, and I'll meet up with you after this large meeting." I said. Then remembered who I was talking to. "And please, TRY not to make a scene," I added before scampering off to catch up with Captain Anjri.

The meeting, really, was not of major importance. All the information Sai and Kakashi had gathered was basically the same as all the information that the Temporarily-Allied-Villages had gathered. It stuck us all in the same place, though, we had a limited number of options: kidnap the child which killed the village, destroy the source which incapacitated most of the village and forced them to move as well as keep the child basically in protective custody which meant sacrificing a number of elite nin to ensure he wasn't caught by the wrong people, destroy the source and kill the child which again killed the whole village, or take the source and the child under the protective custody of the Temporarily-Allied-Villages understanding that we would perish trying to do what is right by ethical standards of not killing innocents. All options that did not include either killing the child or killing the whole village involved the sacrificing of elite nin who would otherwise be crucial in the coming war. It was a standstill.

When these options were relayed to the rest of the camp, the whole large tent of now 7 villages remained silent, racking their brains for what the hell we could do that wouldn't make us feel more like bloodthirsty monsters.

"Why can't we use a genjutsu as protection? Ero-sennin took me to a village surrounded by genjutsu to train, no one knew how to find them unless they were specifically invited in. Couldn't we set something like that up here?" Came an idiotically familiar voice. I probably would have face-palmed in exasperation, but I was sitting with the other captains in the front of the room, which would have led everyone to know the dumb blond was mine if they hadn't already guessed.

"Because," Anjri started coolly, "protective genjutsu only work when a certain number of conditions are met." She lifted a finger, "there has to be a large disturbance in the natural chakra field," another finger went up. "The habitants need to be aware and accepting of its existence," a third finger followed the other two. "Most importantly, no one can be looking specifically for the protected village nor should anyone be aware of its exact location. We all found our way here, kid, many more could find it easily." She stopped for a minute, as if considering that the first two conditions could potentially be met, then sighed rather gustily. "Not to mention we'd need at least a dozen shinobi highly skilled in genjutsu to pull off something complex enough to protect an entire village indefinitely."

The room quieted after her explanation was finished, but you could tell everyone was considering her words. Wondering if there were any possible way to force at least three of the four points she made to be a reality.

One of the other captains spoke up, he had been introduced to me as Capain Zo in the earlier brief meeting.

"Among the present shinobi in my village, I have two proficient genjutsu users, myself being one of them. We could cause a rift in the natural chakra field if we upset the source, not try to destroy it but try to anger it. The civilians are already aware that they have something many people want, I do not think it would be difficult to teach them how to live within the constraints of a genjutsu-protected village. It would be a small price to pay for a further uninterrupted existence. The only remaining problem is to gather a strong enough source of genjutsu users to layer a protective field while the chakra source is disturbed." Following his words were a lot of whispers, all of them sounding rather excited.

"We will need three teams, then." I added, deciding it was time for my contribution to the forming plan. "One with enough power to anger the source, one of genjutsu users to lay the protective fields, and a third group to protect the villagers."

"Once the chakra field is disturbed, most methods of communication will be void. The first two groups you mentioned, Captain, will need to be in contact with each other if this is to work." Another captain, Saumi, I think he name was, spoke that point.

"I actually have just the person for that job," I said laughing lightly. "My subordinate Naruto is able to create mass numbers of shadow clones and use them all effectively to relay information. He could create enough clones to share among all three groups and dispel them at will to spread information among the groups. If that is agreeable to everyone?" I had to ask permission, we were the newest recruits. The tent was filled with what sounded like hundreds of voices all at once, despite the fact that it couldn't have been more than 30.

"Enough!" Captain Anjri shouted, her voice rough and commanding. "We still need to know that we have the genjutsu strength to make this work. All proficient genjutsu users, stand in the far south corner of the tent." There was a large hustle of shinobi as people moved. Eventually, it looked like 10 ninja had settled themselves into the aforementioned corner. "Just 10 of you?" Anjri sounded disappointed, I was too, there was no way we could work this with only 10 shinobi per group. However, I did know something she didn't.

"One of my teammates, currently in the village, is Konoha's Copy Nin, Hatake Kakashi. He is quite proficient in genjutsu and will most definitely be assisting that group." I smiled a little at the shock that rushed to peoples' faces. It was true that at the moment said Copy Nin was not my favorite person in the world, but seeing the reactions to his name never failed to give me a warm fuzzy feeling.

Surprisingly, it was Captain Zo who was quickest to recover from the shock of learning that we would be working with the Shinobi of a Thousand Jutsu. "All those who have been trained _primarily_ in medicine should go to the far north corner as the beginning of the protect-the-villagers group. Those with _secondary_ training in medicine, join the anger-the-source group which should start coming up to the front of the tent near the captains." He turned to look at Anjri, and allowed her to continue separating the leftover ninja in the middle of the tent.

"Well, this looks like quite the show," came a bored-sounding voice, directly in my ear. I flashed a glare at him.

"How the hell did you find us?" I asked, lacking my normal honorific unintentionally. I really hadn't been expecting them back. Kakashi just shrugged.

"I followed your chakra. I put a tag on you this morning, in case something should happen." Damn, he'd never done that before. I was momentarily unsure of whether to be flattered or annoyed. I think it must have shown on my face because Kakashi gave a short shout of genuine laughter. "Damn, you're cute, Tenzo."

That brought me back to reality. "It's Yamato," I hissed, "and for them, it's actually Captain Yamato."

"Right, right," Kakashi waved my warning off, "so who are 'them?'" He asked nodding to the still shouting Captain Anjri and the bustling, talking group of ninja.

I explained everything as quickly and simply as I could, Kakashi had pulled Sai by the elbow to be close enough to hear this part of the conversation. The boy must have been hovering awkwardly while Kakashi and I had talked in whispers. "So," I finished with, "You head over to the group of genjutsu users, Senpai, and I think, Sai, you had best come to the chakra source group with me and I believe Sakura is over there, too. Gai will be with the villagers. Naruto will have a couple hundred clones dispersed among the groups while he, himself, will also be on the protection detail, farthest away from the chakra disruption."

"Hai, Captain Yamato," Sai said, smiling lightly. Kakashi just bounded over the to the genjutsu group, probably to cause some minor chaos because that's just what he did best.

After what seemed like hours, we were finally assembled into three groups. It seemed like the crowd inside the tent had already grown larger, numbering around 40 shinobi. Then it hit me, we probably _had_ been in that meeting tent for hours. The sun was well set on its daily path, and there were now more than 7 clear captains. Anjri was half-smirking at me as she watched me catch on. There had been recruiting groups going out for the past two days since this Temporary-Village-Alliance came into play. I couldn't help but smile back at her.

"This could actually work, Anjri-san."

"I know, I'm impressed with that little blond brat." She sent another, more malicious smirk my way. "I also know that he's yours. I bet he gives more than his fair share of trouble." I just laughed in response and we joined our anger-the-source group. That little blond brat was really starting to impress me. He was incredible in many of his own unique ways.

Yeah, I'm not good at writing mission stuff. So, next chapter will touch on this setting the genjutsu stuff, but then they'll all be headed back to the village and Tenzo and Kakashi will have some interactions ;) I hope I haven't lost you all.


	8. Chapter 8

Thanks for all the awesome reviews, guys :)

The anger-the-source group was mostly comprised of ninja who could run fast and suppress chakra almost completely. A very good thing for a group of people who were intent on angering a source of chakra powerful enough to supply an entire village their livelihood. The protect-villagers group had left first and informed the civilians and the child 'asset' of our plan, one of the Narutos alerted the rest of us as soon as they had accepted our offer. The remaining two groups had immediately split up to get into position.

My group was led by Captain Anjri. Her first order of duty was to find the best route to get as close as possible to the chakra source. She had asked all the members of our group who felt their skills or knowledge would be the most beneficial to this task. I half expected every nin to raise their hand or just shout information, but that wasn't the case. Instead, Sai stepped forward and bowed to her, quickly followed by only 3 other nin. When motioned to, Sai explained what his duties had been, the intel he'd gathered about the village, and how he knew the general location of where the chakra source gave the strongest signal. Anjri had nodded and said he would be one of the leaders. The other chosen leader was a chakra-sensor nin, named Naoki, who had abilities distantly related to the Byakugan in that he could identify individual chakra signatures and follow them back to their immediate and distant sources. He would also be able to tell whether the chakra source was responding to our efforts.

We followed the two young shinobi to a small hill just outside the village. Well, it looked pretty darn plain, but as we neared it, we could all feel the potency of the chakra. Anjri looked to our young leaders.

"Is there a way to get closer to it? Or will we have to call it up?" She asked.

"The villagers say there are caverns, if we hike over to the cliff side," Sai motioned another mile forward, "those allow closer access to it, though they will isolate us from easy escape routes."

Naoki frowned and closed his eyes.

"We shouldn't need to be physically closer. I can read it quite strongly from here and we do not intend to kill it." He said clearly to Anjri. "We will also be much better able to escape from it here in the open if its retaliation is unbearable." There was a murmur among the group about this, but Anjri held up her hand before it got out of control.

"We will stay on this hillside then. If our efforts here are unsuccessful, we will move to the caves and try again." She looked at all of us for a response and we nodded in kind. "Now, to anger it, we need to concentrate battle chakra directly against it, but beware not to intend harm against each other." We nodded again. "Ready your most damage-inducing jutsu and on the count of three, we will release them together aimed at the source hidden under this hill." A third collective nod. We arranged ourselves in a curved line, set to aim straight ahead, but sure not to hit another shinobi in that straight path. Our group of about 40 Narutos moved themselves to stand at our backs, also careful not get in the way.

"Gather your chakra!" Anjri's voice sounded from the middle of the line.

I concentrated on my stabbing jutsu, but used a little twist to make it so that my stakes would drive into the earth rather than rise from it.

"Ready?" The lack of answer was answer enough.

"One!" Hands were at the ready.

"Two!" Eyes narrowed toward the hill.

"Three!" What seemed like a thousand jutsu flew through the air to attack the innocent-looking hill. We felt the ground shudder beneath us.

"Naoki! Report!" Anjri shouted above the groaning of the earth.

"I believe it's working!" He responded. After a moment, though the air definitely seemed heavier, the intense feeling of chakra had receded. "We'll need another round; that one merely woke it up from a long rest." He said, glancing over at Anjri. She nodded and looked towards the Narutos.

"One of you, ask if the genjutsu group is in place." She commanded. A Naruto poofed out of existence.

We waited and took a moment to re-gather our chakra, breathing long and deep until one of the remaining Narutos stepped forward.

"They felt a surge from our first attempt. They are ready with a plan, but it will take at least an hour of a similar but slightly stronger surge." He said, sounding slightly confused, but otherwise energetic about how this plan was coming along.

"An hour?" I asked, that was a long time to keep a disruption in a chakra field that is not used to being disturbed. Anjri also looked a bit skeptical. Naruto just nodded.

"Well, then we have our work cut out for us," Anjri said, looking rather motivated by the challenge. "We will split our line into 6 sections. Each section will be in charge of keeping the source aroused for a full, constant 10 minutes, use whatever means at your disposal. One Naruto, keep time and alert the next section when it is their turn. At the 50 minute mark, have another Naruto communicate with the genjutsu group to determine how much longer they will need to complete their plan. If more time than an hour is necessary, alert our first section that they will have another ten minutes and we will continue until a Naruto from the genjutsu group alerts us to finish. Can you relay that to the genjutsu group?"

"Hai, Captain!" They shouted. One Naruto disappeared, another pulled out a watch. A minute later, they all grinned. "The village-protection group wishes us well and assures us they were all safe during the surge, including the child." A moment later, "the genjutsu group is ready!"

Our line split into 6 separate sections, I was in the second. I took deep, calming breaths and let the adrenaline replenish my chakra. This was going to be interesting. Much better than sitting in a ring of dragons watching Naruto try to cut a waterfall. I smirked, yes, this was going to be _fun_.

"First section, are you ready?"

"Hai!"

"Let's do this!"

The next hour and a half were lost in an explosion of chakra. Those of us that were attacking the source let ourselves be caught in the moment of it. Our adrenaline pumped the blood and chakra directly from our hearts to our hands and out towards the source. When we were 'resting,' we were caught in the sensations of the battle anyway. We felt the anger of chakra below us and the ferocity of the chakra surrounding us. It was a bone-shaking, head-pounding, heart-thumping rush. I hadn't felt this purely alive ever. It was like a drug, so addictively amazing in all the worst ways. A glance around as soon as a Naruto yelled that we could stop told me that I was far from the only one who felt this way.

As we settled down from our attack, we rode out the tired fury of the source. We felt it roll in our bodies, like fierce white-tipped waves until it finally retreated back into a gentle tug. Soon, we found ourselves laughing, patting each other on the back, shaking hands, broad grins on even the most serious of faces, and finally we felt the exhaustion of what we'd just done kick in. I turned to the group of Narutos, now diminished to about 15. They were smiling though.

"They say the genjutsu was successful. They are now securing the layers and one member has been sent to explain to the villagers what they need to know." He sounded tired as well, but I knew he could still handle quite a bit more. Thank goodness for that stamina machine kid. I'm surprised my face didn't split in half, I was grinning so much.

Eventually, we decided it would probably be best if we all met back in the original encampment to regroup into our home village teams. This village had felt enough trauma from the source, the last thing the citizens needed was more shinobi around now. I ended up travelling back to the encampment with the kid, Naoki. He was an orphan from the Village Hidden in the Stone, one of their top chuunin. I was impressed and I told him so.

"Thanks," he murmured gently, probably not accustomed to such praise. I just gave him a light smile.

"I am a jounin of Konoha, I was also raised as an orphan," I didn't need to go into the gritty details, but hey, this kid was far from alone. "Naruto has been orphaned since the day he was born, and he hasn't passed the chuunin exams yet! We all come from the same background even as unique as it is. Perhaps we ought to be keeping that in mind as this war draws closer." I said gently, thinking of the last conversation I had with Yugao about how all shinobi are more similar than we are different. Naoki nodded in agreement.

"Hai, there are many arguments that could be avoided in this war if we step back to see that we are only fighting against ourselves." Kid had wisdom beyond his years. "Unfortunately, our Tsuchikage holds grudges that he refuses to part with," the boy sighed here, then shook his head. "We admire him greatly and will follow his plans. He would have agreed with our decision here; however this is concerning civilians who are not on the same level as shinobi. In fact, he would probably order that we spy on you of Konoha while we are in such close quarters." After years of dealing with a man who conversed solely in sarcasm, I picked up on his lilt and chuckled.

"It's a good thing he does not know of the collaboration and we shall part as friends from unnamable small hidden villages," I responded, unable to resist sending him a wink. He grinned broadly back at me.

"Hai, Captain!" He affirmed as we reached the encampment. We would soon join the bustle of shinobi congratulating one another and trying to find their own teams. I held out my hand for him to shake.

"Thank you for your part in this, Naoki, we couldn't have done it without you." He beamed at me and took my hand.

"Thank you for your contribution, Captain Yamato, you were equally as essential." I beamed right back at him and we shook firmly before he disappeared in the sea of people.

I just stood and took in the sight for a minute. If only I could take a picture, forward it to every single village, and ask them what exactly we were fighting for…

"AH! Our Devilishly Handsome, Youthful Captain! We Have Successfully Completed Our Just Endeavor! What an Awe-Inspiring Achievement for YOUTH!" I grinned. Found my team.

Gai appeared seemingly out of nowhere carting along a half-awake, still oddly full of energy, certain young blond shinobi. Lagging far enough, but close enough, behind him were Sakura and Sai, trying desperately not to look like they were following around the man with the bowl-cut and horrid fashion sense. I waved a welcome to all four, now to find our actual elusive captain.

"ETERNAL RIVAL! I SEE THAT VOCIFEROUS HEAD OF SILVER HAIR! YOU CANNOT HIDE FROM ME NOW WITH THAT HIP DISAPPEARING ACT! YOUR TRENDY WAYS WILL NEVER EVADE ME!" Well, that was easy too. Gai would be able to drag Kakashi back to us unconscious if he had to. I, on the other hand, had only to catch the Pups' eyes to let them know we'd wait right where we stood for those infamous rivals.


	9. Chapter 9

Our trip back to our mission house was, of course, uneventful. We talked about each of our groups' doings, exclaimed delight at the ability of many different villages to work so cohesively, and overall exuded confident happiness at the outcome of our mission. The conversation continued as we packed all our things, I dispelled the house jutsu, and we started our not-too-long journey home to Konoha. Gai, Sakura, Sai, and Naruto were well wrapped up in reliving the highlights of the mission. I moved slightly faster to be at pace with Kakashi, the others' voices a much more pleasant background noise now.

"Hey, Senpai," I said as I reached him. He turned ever so slightly, but didn't slow down.

"Yo," he sounded tired.

"You used way too much of your Sharingan, didn't you, Senpai?" I asked, realizing as he narrowed his eyes at me that I should have made it a statement, not a question.

"Don't worry about it, Tenzo. I'll be fine." His tone wasn't particularly any emotion, just his usual bored, casual, hip, and trendy voice. I wasn't about to pester him.

"Well, we were able to protect the whole village as well as the child," I said, smiling, "that was quite the pleasant turn of events."

"Hai," he responded. "Everything with your group went well?"

"Most definitely. It was exhilarating, one of the best experiences of my life," I said.

"One of, huh?" Kakashi's eye twinkled at me. I laughed, in far too good of a mood to let him get to me.

"Mmhmm," I responded eagerly. I moved closer to him, so that my chest pressed close against his shoulder. "How was it for you, Senpai?" I purred into his ear.

I felt his light shudder of surprise before he turned to let his lips graze my ear.

"I, myself, feel INVIGORATED with YOUTH!" He shouted the last word as I had to stop on a branch from shock. His voice was a perfect imitation of Gai, as if he'd done it for years.

"MY RIVAL! YOU FEEL IT AS WELL?"

"HOW COULD SUCH A DISPLAY OF INNOCENT JUSTICE EXIST UNSEEN?"

"I AM BLINDED FROM HAPPINESS AT YOUR ACCEPTANCE OF YOUTH'S POWER, ETERNAL RIVAL!" Birds burst around Gai as he caught up to Kakashi, and a rainbow came into spontaneous being around them. What the hell?

"WE SHALL FOREVER BE BONDED THROUGH INNOCENCE, PURITY, YOUTH, WHOLESOMENESS, VIRTUE, AND JUSTICE! THIS BOND SHALL NEVER BE BROKEN!" The two turned back to face our gobsmacked team and mirrored a 'good guy' pose at us. Somehow Kakashi even got the blinding teeth twinkle to be evident through his mask.

The only sound I could make was shouts of laughter. It's easy to forget that sometimes Kakashi's dry sarcasm took a break and lent itself to pure, good-natured humor. Naruto, Sai, and Sakura's obvious confused, dumb-founded looks added greatly to my amusement and soon I could barely breathe from laughing.

I'm not actually quite sure how we made it back to the village so quickly. Kakashi and Gai kept spouting undecipherable statements about Youth at each other, my own lungs felt like they could never get enough air, and the Pups were still in such a state of shock at their sensei that I have no idea how they weren't smacking into trees left and right. Needless to say, our entrance at the village gates was also taken in confusion as to why Kakashi and Gai were acting like such inseparable friends. I just shook my head in amusement at the gate-guard chuunin and told the remainder of the team to go home, rest, and we'd pick up training tomorrow after I brought (or forced Kakashi to bring) the mission report in.

As much as I would have loved to keep watching Kakashi freak people out, I really felt the need for a long, hot, post-mission shower. Amusing as Kakashi was being, however, he was also imitating Gai; I couldn't handle the youthful power of two Gais for much longer. We had been jumping through the trees like that for at least 2 hours.

"Welcome home, Nymph," came a voice from my living room as I opened my door.

"What are you doing here? It's not nearly late enough for a sex-capade gone wrong." I asked the man lounging on my couch with a book.

"Yeah," Laori sighed, looking up, "I got bored at headquarters. Figured I'd come see if you wanted to spar or something. You weren't here, so I helped myself to your bookshelf."

"Ah," I couldn't figure out why his presence annoyed me so much at the moment. It wasn't unusual for us to seek each other out when we were ANBU teammates. Maybe the exhaustion from the day was getting to me. It had been an insanely long, chakra-draining day. "Well, I'm going to take a good long shower and probably lie around mostly naked for the rest of the day."

"Not interested in a match?" He asked, still hopeful.

"Nah, just got back from a mission, a short one apparently, but still. I'm dead tired. I'll tell you about it later."

"Alright, I'll give you that," he stood up and stretched, replacing the book on the shelf. "You owe me a kickass mission story though."

"Of course!" I grinned at him, still grinning as I shut the door behind him. Normally I enjoyed other people's presence around, welcoming me home after a mission, so this turn of events was a little disconcerting. I decided I would think about it during my shower, then maybe pay Genma a visit. Or Yugao, she'd enjoy hearing the story of our mission, especially my conversation with that kid, Naoki. I'd call on Laori later and apologize for being rude, not that he would really care, but it would be good for my conscience.

Genma would probably be with Mai though, so I probably shouldn't interrupt. Yugao might be out on a mission, and I never went to her apartment without sending a note or something first. Laori would quickly find another person to spar with since I wasn't interested, then he'd probably get absorbed in finding a date and ditching me at a bar. I sighed in mild frustration as I shed my clothes in the bathroom and turned the water on. People and multiple friendships could be so damn confusing. Not simple like how Kakashi and I could have sex, I could swear at him, we'd be able to continue functioning as a cohesive team, and then he'd be able to make me laugh my ass off. WAIT. Now where the hell did that thought come from? I was NOT yearning for a relationship with Kakashi. I was NOT about to get into a shower thinking about him again. I hit myself good and hard on the head.

I could slip a note under Yugao's door asking if she'd have a chance to chat soon. Genma had guard duty on Monday, I could drop by at his break. And Laori leaving me at a bar was nothing new, maybe I could manage not to get too drunk and instead take someone home for myself. I groaned in more evident frustration. I didn't want one night stands anymore, that thought was not appealing at all. I'd worked beyond my younger self's emotional issues. My mind wandered back to Kakashi that night. Fuck. I wanted him again. That had been a damn good hand job for someone who could barely sit up properly. Plus, just thinking about giving him that blow job was getting me hard again.

"Damn bastard ninja," I muttered as I started stroking myself. Might as well get off one more time from that memory. I used to do it often after he left me. I pumped myself hard remembering his moans, his shaking, and my name on his breathless lips. My speed increased as I recalled his orgasm strong enough to leave him weak, the feel of his climax around my mouth, his semen on my tongue, and his lust-laden eyes closing in pleasure. I came hard, moaning his name.

I finished my shower pretty quickly after that. Now I was more than ready to go drown in sake. I didn't even care if I was alone or it was still only early evening. My stupid body had apparently decided it would always want Kakashi and there was nothing my mind could do about it. Me and my mercurial mood. It had really been a great day and now I was once again caught in my confusing emotions. I really should have gone to spar with Laori, or at least been inviting about him hanging around my apartment for a while. Just as I was thinking this, there was a knock on my door.

I walked over, confused, and would really have been floored if it was actually him. Instead, it was a young, pretty, long purple haired kunoichi with big, sad dark green eyes.

"Yugao," I said, slightly stunned.

"Hey, Yamato," she responded lightly. "I saw, well heard, Gai and Kakashi outside. I was curious if you knew what happened. Kakashi-senpai hasn't acted that way in years." She sounded half worried and half amused.

"Ah," I considered this for a minute before realizing we were just standing in my doorway. I opened my door wider. "I was actually just going to leave a note for you. Would you like to come in?"

She stepped gracefully into my apartment and closed the door softly behind her as we moved to my couch. "You wanted to talk? About Gai the Second or something else?"

"Something else actually, though they may be related. The mission we just returned from left us all in a pretty great mood. It involved collaboration with several different villages," I started, but my heart wasn't really in it. She tilted her head at me.

"You don't really look like you're in a great mood," she observed. She didn't make it a question, and I knew she wouldn't pry if I wanted her to stay out of it.

"I crashed a bit from my high," I said, "too much other stuff on my mind."

"Anything you want to talk about?" She asked.

"Maybe," I thought about her offer. I knew she was trustworthy, and she would probably have better advice than Genma or Raido could offer if I told them the truth. I decided to evade it for now. "How are you doing?"

"I wish people would stop asking me that," she sighed with a huff that fluttered her bangs. "I get by, I'll never be the same, but I'm alive and still determined to keep it that way. Isn't that what matters?"

"Yeah, I suppose. I'm sorry I asked, I'll phrase it differently and trick you next time," I sent her a smile. She grinned lightly in response.

"I'd appreciate that." Something about that response made me decide I was going to come clean.

"Would you like a cup of tea?" I asked, signaling to her that we would probably be here for a while. She settled into my couch.

"Sure, just plain green tea is fine. Thanks." I went to the kitchen, grabbed a couple mugs and started boiling water. A few minutes later, I had two steaming mugs full of green tea to walk back to my living room with. She looked comfy on my couch and accepted the tea smiling.

"Alright, start talking," she commanded gently. I thought for a moment about how best to start this conversation.

"Do you remember the rumors about me and Kakashi near the beginning of my ANBU years?" I asked. She seemed to consider her response for a moment.

"Which ones? There were many."

"The.. ah.. sex related ones. That we were together." I blushed a little and looked into my mug rather than at her.

"Mmhmm, I remember those. I also should tell you that I know they were true. For a while anyway."

"What?! How?" I demanded, so shocked I forgot my embarrassment. She sighed.

"I had a crush on Kakashi for a long time. I drank too much one night and confronted him, asked why he'd never cared for me as more than a comrade. He tried to avoid it by asking me about how things were going with my then-teacher, Hayate. He must have known we were sort of dating at that point." She stopped and shook her head gently, "it wasn't that I wanted to give up Hayate to run into Kakashi's arms, I knew by then it would never have happened between us. But, you know how alcohol makes you, especially when you run into someone important to you who seems to consider you unimportant to him." She sighed again before continuing. "Anyway, I got it in my head that I would make him drink with me and admit everything that was so unattractive about me." She turned her glance to me.

"You know Kakashi doesn't actually drink more than 2 shots whenever we get him to come out with us, right?" She asked.

"I've suspected that, but I also know most shinobi hold their alcohol pretty well. I just assumed he was really, really good at it." She smiled.

"Yeah, that's what most people think. In truth though, he fakes it. He won't drink more than two shots unless he has something incredibly distracting on his mind. As it happens, he did the night I cornered him. We each had a few shots, and he downed every one of them." I raised my eyebrow, she gave me a grim smile. "He talks when he gets drunk. A lot. It's like opening floodgates, everything pours out.

"I asked him again why he never once looked at me twice. He said it was because he was attracted to men. Always had been, it wasn't anything personal against me. Needless to say, I was shocked. I asked how he knew, if he was sure. He told me about his first time. With you," she blushed slightly, as I could see her remembering this conversation. I was actually horrified that Kakashi had talked about that with someone, she must have seen the emotions on my face because she continued quickly. "He didn't tell me all the details, or if he did, I don't remember them. I just remember him saying that he couldn't imagine begin attracted to anyone after he'd seen your body, your responses, and felt everything so intensely with just you. That you were so much better than even what he had imagined in Icha Icha." She blushed hard, I couldn't even make expressions. "I only remember all of this because I wanted to know so badly what was wrong with me. I just learned from it that he never looked at me twice because he was always looking at you."

"Damn," I breathed.

"I'm sorry," she whispered, "I know that's way too personal, but I had a feeling that was where you were going when you brought up the rumors. I've never told anyone else about it. Not even Hayate. I shouldn't have been told, it was really none of my business. I know he told me a lot that night that he'd never told anyone else, I just don't remember it. He doesn't either. I've learned that he's also quite prone to memory black outs when he drinks. But, we did find a way to be friendlier with each other after that." She stopped and let me absorb everything that she had just said.

So, she knew. All this time, she knew. And Kakashi had really thought that much of me? I was the reason he knew he was gay? Even I wasn't secure enough to admit that I only liked men. I had still experimented with other people. Talk about an information overload. Finally I sighed and turned to explain my current predicament.

"We didn't last long," I started. "Only about two months, then he left me; never breathed a word about it again. I never knew why, what I did wrong, if he was only playing me as a joke or something. It felt like he took my heart out, ripped it up, and then flung the pieces in my face laughing as I had to pick them up. I had fallen in love with him over those two months. Eventually, I guess I learned to live with it. It got easier to forget when he left ANBU. But, all the memories started coming back as we've been working together again. I'm getting drunk a lot more," I sighed and looked guiltily at her. "We had sex on this last mission. I couldn't help it, I just wanted him and he encouraged it. It was the best I'd had since our last time and he fell asleep so perfectly on me when we finished. I just….. Couldn't take it. I didn't know what he was thinking. Every heart-broken, painful memory came back full forces. I swore at him and left him outside." I stopped to watch her reaction. Her lips were slightly parted, but otherwise she looked sad yet understanding. "The rest of the mission went fine. Actually, it was really amazing. But now that we're back, I can't get him off my mind. I'm positive that I'm still in love with him and it's kind of killing me." My voice broke a little on the last sentence, and I turned my attention to the now luke-warm tea. She cleared her throat.

"Did you ever ask him why he left you?" I looked at her, shocked. She gave a gentle chuckle. "You're allowed to do that, you know. It's part of being human."

"It's not like I've never thought about asking him. I just thought it was against the rules." She laughed at that. I narrowed my eyes at her. "Or maybe I just didn't want to be hurt even more by the answer."

"I'm sorry for laughing, but you should ask him. When you're ready. Maybe the answer will surprise you."

"Do you know something you're not telling me?" I prepared my ghoul face, ready to scare her into admitting whatever it was.

"No, I just know that Kakashi is more fucked up than most people give him credit for. And he is number one in really fucking up relationships, regardless of if he wants them to work or not. Unless, of course, you're Gai and simply refuse to be pushed around." I put the ghoul face on hold and considered that. There was irrefutable proof that Kakashi had fucked up every friendship he'd ever had other than the rivalry with the crazy, green spandex wearing taijutsu master. Maybe there was a correlation. No one else really pushed forcefully back at the famous copy nin. No one but Gai fought to be in his life. Maybe he hadn't truly meant to fuck everything up and I just hadn't seen that to know he only wanted to be invited back in. I downed the rest of my tea quickly and tried not to let my mind wander further down that path. No point in getting my hopes up. It had been way too long to repair any damage now.

Yugao ended up staying until long after the sun truly disappeared beyond the horizon. Eventually, she stood and said she should probably be getting home. I walked her out and said she was welcome back anytime. She'd smiled and said I was likewise welcome to her apartment anytime, regardless of whether I left a note a sufficient amount of time beforehand. I smiled in return and we said our good nights and see you soons.

I blame her entirely for why I ended up crouched by a half-open bedroom window that was not my own.


	10. Chapter 10

The occupant of the room I was creeping on had probably been asleep before I showed up. But he was well trained enough as a ninja to be awakened by the squeaking of the window as I pushed it farther open. He decided not to wake up though. I let myself in and sat on top of his bureau, propping up one foot, wrapping an arm around my knee. I watched him for a while, let the thoughts chase each other around my head. I had taken a shot or two of sake before coming here, but I was perfectly aware that I wasn't drunk. Talking with Yugao rang an alarm in my head. She was getting by, she and Hayate must have had issues at some point or other, but she would always love him. She survived his death, still loving him was not hurting her the way loving Kakashi was hurting me. That just didn't seem right. My ultimate decision from our talk was that I was going to ask him why he left me. If the answer hurt, somehow, in my two shots brain, I'd convinced myself it would be actually be helpful.

We couldn't continue the way we were now. I knew that. My moods were strong enough that other people could sense them and that wasn't fair to anyone. Another war was coming, I should be focusing on that, not emotional matters. If there was any chance that asking him this would give me some closure I had to do it.

Even though I knew he was awake, though, I couldn't 'wake' him. So, I just stared and waited. He would recognize my chakra signature, if anything. He already knew who I was. He would 'wake up' when he wanted to.

About half an hour later, the figure on the bed rolled over, his head turned toward me, face aimed up, and his eyes opened and glared directly at me. He knew exactly where I was. I guess I'd expected that.

"What exactly do you want?" He asked, sounding rather cold. Not that I could blame him, I mean, I'd be pretty pissed if our roles were reversed. "I can't sleep with you sitting there watching me."

"Why did you leave me?" I blurted, needing to get it out soon, I could feel the bravery effects of my pre-confrontation shots wearing off.

His glare died and he turned away from me again, pulling his blankets over his head and burying his face into his pillow. I eased myself off the bureau and moved closer to his bed.

"Senpai?" I asked, a little more gently, more the tone of voice I'd meant to ask my initial question in. Kakashi made no movements. I just stood there, not quite sure what to do with myself, but I couldn't leave if there was any fleeting chance he would answer me.

"Senpai, I am not leaving until I get an answer from you." Might as well let him know right off the bat. I sat down heavily on the side of his bed, sure to make the movement obvious enough that he would feel it.

After another good 10 minutes, he pulled his face away from the pillow and his blanket came down enough that his whole head was visible in the dark.

"Must we really have this conversation _now_?" His voice was almost whining.

"Yes," I said, plucking up the pillow and tossing it out of his reach so he couldn't hide from me again. He gave a tortured sigh.

"It was such a long time ago, Tenzo –"

"No bullshit Kakashi." He huffed another sigh and I turned slightly to look him in the eye. "I want you to tell me of your own free will, but I'm not above forcing a few shots down your throat to get you talking."

"Shit," he muttered lightly under his breath. I was close enough to hear it though. He sat up straight in his bed and leaned against the head board. I toed out of my shoes and swung my legs up onto the bed to sit cross-legged in front of him.

"I…." He started, then stopped, seeming to look for words, and then started again. "I am sorry, Tenzo, that I left you. I didn't mean for it to be over, at the time. It was a long solo mission and I hated how much I missed you. When I got back, I had decided I was never going to miss someone that much again, especially not while they were still alive. I convinced myself that you would be better off, too. I'm no good, I already had enough horrible influence on you as your captain, no need to extenuate the circumstances," he stopped again. I waited patiently, I had somehow expected this much anyway. He lifted his head and looked directly at me now. "I was questioning myself a lot, about everything in my life and I didn't want to drag you into that. You were so young, interacting with people was still beyond your comprehension and it was adorable. But, you would want to help me, and I couldn't have that." We listened to the clock tick for a few minutes, I still had some patience.

"Eventually, by the time I decided I wanted to talk to you again, try to be with you again, Genma started making fun of you for a couple one night stands. I'd missed that they'd happened. I asked him about it, he said you'd picked up a couple women at bars, and he'd gone over to your place one night and heard the passions. I didn't blame you, I wasn't angry with you. I turned it on myself, it was all my fault after all. I convinced myself you were straight and really didn't have any interest in me anymore."

"Seriously?" I asked incredulously when he seemed to be finished. "That's it? That is everything? How the fuck do you let something that stupid break my heart?" I stormed off the bed and felt the need to something physically self-abusive, like run 500 laps around Konoha on my hands. "You were in a period of self-doubt and you didn't want help? What the fuck was I there for then? I really was just your little fuck buddy! I can't fucking believe you, Kakashi!" My voice rose higher until I was actually yelling and swearing at him, stomping in frustrated circles around his bedroom. "Of course I slept with other people! You LEFT me, you prick!" I was stopped in the middle of my lap around the room. Kakashi's hands on my shoulders.

"I. Am. Sorry. Tenzo." He shook me lightly with each word. He repeated this until I shut up and the fire died a little in my eyes. "For everything," he added. "I didn't understand everything then. I know a lot more now, but I've been fearing that it's far too late."

"What does that mean?" I asked, my eyes narrowing.

"I've missed you," he said simply. "A lot. I am happy you're back in my life." The second part sounded a bit like he was trying out foreign words.

"Someone told you to say that," I accused. He just nodded.

"I had a rough transition from ANBU back to normal jounin life for many reasons. It didn't help that being away from ANBU, I knew I really no longer had a chance with you. A couple years in, I met someone who was in far more pain than me. His lover went rogue and attempted to kill him. You heard the story of Naruto's graduation from the academy?" He asked, it seemed way off topic, but I nodded anyway, that had been big news. "Mizuki and Iruka had been seeing each other for a number of years. Iruka had no idea why his partner snapped. I lost track of my drinks while he talked, and soon enough I was talking to him about you. I took him back to my place. We had an… arrangement for about 3 years. We became quite good friends. He's a very caring person and I'd considered asking him to be in a more committed relationship with me a few times. But I knew it would have been fair to him. I could sleep next to him as easily as I could sleep in an empty bed. I could come home from a mission to his care or get fixed up at the hospital without much difference. The main reason it would have been unfair to him, though, was that when we had sex, or I was just on my own, it never stopped being you that I pictured. Iruka deserves much more love and passion than that. I ended it with him as soon as I realized how much I was holding him back from truly moving on. He had also come to a similar decision, as he wanted to try really dating again. When you were chosen to temporarily replace me, I told Iruka when he came to visit me during my chakra exhaustion recovery. He immediately started coaching me on how to behave with you." He looked a little sheepish for a moment, "number one on the list of don'ts that he gave me was to sleep with you, but I really couldn't have stopped myself that night. I wanted you way too much." He stopped, watching me for a reaction to all of this. I was pretty much stuck on the fact that Kakashi had been consistently sleeping with one other man for 3 years. Somehow that went against every pre-conception I still had of the masked man. "The most important thing Iruka taught me was that I need to be 100% honest with you. I'm not good at that, but I have been trying. Especially starting now," he sounded final and determined.

"What…" My voice came out hoarse as if I hadn't spoken in days. I cleared my throat and started again. "What exactly were your self-doubting questions that you didn't want to talk to me about? You know I probably could have sympathized with almost anything you were going through." He looked at me for a moment, then took in a deep breath.

"I am not seme. I don't think I ever was," I froze in shock. _That's_ what this was about? No freaking way. He continued before I could comment though. "I've had to be in control of everything since I was 6 years old. Well, really since my father started drinking regularly when I was about 5. It never occurred to me that I would ever want someone else to be more dominant. When I was with you, I felt like you were already assuming I would be top, in the moment, it had made sense to me too. Iruka, likewise, assumed I preferred top. Because I am a captain on the battlefield, I should be dominant in all aspects of my life. I'm not though, I've done what my circumstances have given to me. I am captain out of necessity. Many are saying that I will be the next Hokage, I would do it, if necessary to protect my village and my friends, but it is not my natural state. I want _your_ arms around _me_. I want to be yours, not necessarily for you to be mine. I'm not sure you would understand it, you especially wouldn't have then. I also didn't know how to put it in words then; I just felt like as much as I enjoyed our time together, something was just a bit off. Like our shoes were on the wrong feet." He shrugged. "You can yell at me now."

I just looked at him, shook my head, and started chuckling.

"Really Senpai, you never fail to shock me." He let go of my shoulders, which I had barely noticed he still had a hold of.

"Is there anything else you want to know while we're here? I'd really like to get back to sleep if not. That genjutsu took a lot out of me, I had a reputation to live up to and an entire village to protect." My chuckle turned into a fuller laugh as he rolled his eyes and climbed back into bed. I let myself laugh for a few good minutes at how this whole situation had turned around on me. Everything was far from perfect between the two of us, but I had hope now. I wasn't calling Kakashi a bastard in my head and I knew that if I went home, I'd probably be able to fall asleep within the hour. It was a nice thought.

"Hey Kakashi?" I asked, sitting on the edge of his bed again.

"Yeah?" He asked, I could hear the sleepiness already filtering through his voice.

"I think Iruka was probably right. We shouldn't have sex for a while. Not until we can work a few things out. But, do you mind if I sleep here tonight anyway?" He turned to look at me, but said nothing. He just pulled back the blankets and moved over to make room.

As I peeled off my shirt and snuggled down next to him, I heard a slight mumble.

"What was that?" I whispered.

"You have to get the pillow. I'm just going to use you." I grinned, got up and grabbed the pillow I'd tossed aside earlier. I settled back into the bed and opened my arms. A half-asleep silver-haired copy ninja wiggled closer to me and rested his head on my chest. I closed my arms around him and fell asleep with my thumb stroking his shoulder.


End file.
